Re: Nikon D90 defective Matrix metering

On Mon, 6 Apr 2009 10:52:37 -0700
C J Campbell <> wrote:
> The difference between a good photographer and a snap-shooter is the
> ability to understand and deal with the limitations of what cameras
> can do. That includes a good understanding of lighting problems and
> what to do about them.
>
The difference between a technically capable photographer and a
snap-shooter is an understanding of the process that commits an image
to the camera. There's more to being a good photographer than getting
good focus and exposure.

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>> Many people at the D40-D90 forum at DPreview agree on this. Even a camera
>> salesman told that a lot of people bring back the D90 because they don't
>> meter right. The salesman told them to either under expose by 0.5 to 1
>> stop or use center weight. Using the last and holding it with the horizon
>> in the middle, gives much better results than MM anytime; no or less
>> blown skies and still enough detail in the landscape.
>> I still think that MM *should* be able to do this job better.
>>
This also works with D40/40x/60. Haven't got round to trying it with D90
yet. And, yes, MM should do a better job.
PDM

"Rob Morley" <> wrote in message
news:20090408035931.4dd10f8f@bluemoon...
> On Tue, 7 Apr 2009 13:50:47 +0100
> "Focus" <> wrote:
>
>> Henri Cartier-Bresson's most famous picture was taken by pure
>> accident/coincidence.
>
> Photojournalism: f8 and be there ...
>
>> Anyway: nobody here seems to understand what I was saying
>
> I just found it tedious and irrelevant.
>>
>> And before I get a lot of *teaching* again: with all camera's I had,
>> I *can* get the results I want.
>
> That's just great, well done.
>>
>> Focus of this thread should be: why, why and why?
>>
> Focus of this thread is wherever the participants take it.

Can I suggest that instead of posting your complaints to this group that you
all complain to Nikon. When I asked Nikon about the problem on the
D40/40x/D60 Nikon responded that they were not aware of any complaints. I've
mentioned this to Nikon several times. They won't do anything until they are
pestered. So get pestering. Bobard them with e-mails, get your freinds to do
the same; only this will actually get them to do something.
PDM

C J Campbell <> wrote:
>
>Even Bresson did not just walk around pointing the camera
>aimlessly, squeezing the shutter with his shut. Bresson worked hard to
>capture his moments. He was not a chimpanzee randomly pecking keys on a
>typewriter to produce the works of Shakespeare. Bresson's work is a
>tribute to the documentary photographer's ability to anticipate,
>visualize and capture a moment all in a split second. But he did not
>skip any of those steps, whether he realized it or not.

All true, but HCB was a prolific shooter and took a great many photos
while out shooting. Even though there are many volumes of his published
work, we have seen only very few of those shots.

Perhaps there is a valid comparison to be made with National Geographic
shooters who typically produced over 10,000 shots on film in order to
illustrate an article with only a couple of dozen, if that.

I am not suggesting (in either case) that the published shots happened
by chance. Far from it: I have no doubt that great care was taken with
the majority of shots taken, and that a very large percentage of them
would be considered suitable for publication.

However, I also have no doubt that the taking of such large numbers of
images in both cases actively contributes to the extremely high standard
of published work - work to which we are privileged to have access at
the small cost of buying a book, or the magazine.

On Apr 9, 2:54 pm, Alan Browne <>
wrote:
> C J Campbell wrote:
> > Nat Geo photographers do not always take 10,000 images and select only a
> > dozen. Sometimes they have the opportunity to do that; sometimes not.
> > Sometimes you get only a handful of images to choose from. That's the
> > way the cookie crumbles.
>
> Actually some nat geo photogs don't even see the photos until they're
> published, and they might see only a small percentage of the remaining
> stock photos. In the film days they would ship undeveloped film back to
> DC for development and the photo editors, working with the article
> writer would decide which photos to use.
>
> In the digital age, I'm not sure what the modus operandi is, but it
> probably involves electronic transfer to DC, and again the photog is not
> the one choosing what goes into the article.
>
> --
> -- r.p.e.35mm user resource:http://www.aliasimages.com/rpe35mmur.htm
> -- r.p.d.slr-systems:http://www.aliasimages.com/rpdslrsysur.htm
> -- [SI] gallery & rulz:http://www.pbase.com/shootin
> -- e-meil: Remove FreeLunch.
> -- usenet posts from gmail.com and googlemail.com are filtered out.

Part of it is, you're out in the field for months at a time. You don't
get to process the images and see what is there. Maybe you'll get
feedback. Way different than how most of us shoot.

Think of it as you're taking your gear with you somewhere where there
is NO support. What you carry in and film. Or digital cards.

I've read on line of going to the Galapagos as sort of similar.

Of course you're expected to have decent images on those 10,000 you
send in. that's not a lot, only about 300 rolls.

Much easier to have decent shots the vast majority of the time than it
was 40 years ago. Digital wasn't around, but even with film. Much
easier to shoot 10,000 shots also. Used to be 2 or 3 frames a sec was
fast. Anybody ever used flashbulbs? Thought not...

Yeah, Kodak Magic Cubes. One of the many camera types, mainly for
Instamatic, had the film that was in a cartridge. Used to have one
that was blue for tungsten film I think. Somebody actually came out
with an adaptor to put on top of a 35mm so you could use the cubes.
Might have been some 3rd party that did it. One camera store used to
have all sorts of odd stuff by mail like that.

Didn't know you could have them go off by dropping them. They were the
improvement over the small peanut flash bulbs. Damn, that's been....35
years???

Flash bulbs were fun as you couldn't carry a lot of them, came in huge
boxes, think long ship model kit type boxes, maybe 12 or 20. Surface
used to really melt after use. And they were hot. But way faster and
more stable than electronic flash. At least back then.

Used to carry pockets full of them.

Never had one explode during use, but heard they might do it. Came in
various sizes also.

Which is what the F mode was for on old PC flash connectors. no, not
personal computers.

frank wrote:
> On Apr 10, 5:19 am, Bob Larter <> wrote:
>> frank wrote:
>> [...]
>>> fast. Anybody ever used flashbulbs? Thought not...
>> Well, not since I was a kid. Remember the 4 shot bulbs that rotated
>> after each shot?
>
> Yeah, Kodak Magic Cubes. One of the many camera types, mainly for
> Instamatic, had the film that was in a cartridge.

Yep, that's them.
> Didn't know you could have them go off by dropping them.

That's news to me too. I used to zap them with a 9V battery to set them
off for fun.
> Flash bulbs were fun as you couldn't carry a lot of them, came in huge
> boxes, think long ship model kit type boxes, maybe 12 or 20. Surface
> used to really melt after use.

<nods> The glass would actually bubble up under the safety plastic.
> Had IR ones for IR film also. Whoo hooo. High tech.

"IR" ones? What would be the difference between those & the standard
variety?

In article <49e0908a$>, Bob Larter
<> wrote:
> > Yeah, Kodak Magic Cubes. One of the many camera types, mainly for
> > Instamatic, had the film that was in a cartridge.
>
> Yep, that's them.
>
> > Didn't know you could have them go off by dropping them.
>
> That's news to me too. I used to zap them with a 9V battery to set them
> off for fun.

if you used a battery to fire them, then they were regular flash cubes.

magicubes were mechanically fired by a spring which when released, hit
a pin on the bulb which caused it to flash. you could flash one bulb
by poking a screwdriver into one of the holes, or if you threw a
magicube on the ground, all four springs would release and all four
bulbs would flash.

regular flash cube on the left, magicube on the right:
<http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2062/2541617504_2606640de2.jpg>
> > Had IR ones for IR film also. Whoo hooo. High tech.
>
> "IR" ones? What would be the difference between those & the standard
> variety?

they put out infrared light which is invisible to humans. with
infrared film, one could take flash photos without anyone noticing. a
photographer named weegee was most known for this, often taking photos
inside theatres of the audience. these days, one can use an infrared
flash head.

"nospam" <> wrote in message
news:110420090627593888%...
> In article <49e0908a$>, Bob Larter
> <> wrote:
>
>> > Yeah, Kodak Magic Cubes. One of the many camera types, mainly for
>> > Instamatic, had the film that was in a cartridge.
>>
>> Yep, that's them.
>>
>> > Didn't know you could have them go off by dropping them.
>>
>> That's news to me too. I used to zap them with a 9V battery to set them
>> off for fun.
>
> if you used a battery to fire them, then they were regular flash cubes.
>
> magicubes were mechanically fired by a spring which when released, hit
> a pin on the bulb which caused it to flash. you could flash one bulb
> by poking a screwdriver into one of the holes, or if you threw a
> magicube on the ground, all four springs would release and all four
> bulbs would flash.
>
Guess there are a lot of old guys posting to this group (yeah! all right, I
remember them too!).
PDM

Magicubes had an 'explosive' charge in them to create the flash. In the base
of the 'cube was a little spring wire for each bulb. The camera had a
plunger that pushed the spring wire off of it's holder, it hit the charge,
and flashed. If you could jar the 'cube sufficiently to knock the spring off
it's holder, you got a flash. I never tried it (damn things were
expensive!), but I suspect that if you threw it against a hard object and it
hit top first, you could probably fire all four sides at once. The advantage
of the Magicube was that there was no battery required to fire, and hence no
concerns of a dead battery or corroded contacts.

The Magicubes were slightly larger and had a different base from the earlier
flashcubes. The flashcubes were basically four AG1 bulbs in a cube
container. I once
'inherited' an adaptor for flashcubes that mounted on a camera shoe, had a
PC sync cord and a battery (22.5V?). This one carried the Konica brand. Not
having much use for it, I sold it on eBay, and got $10 for it!

While on the subject of convenience-oriented flashbulbs, there was also the
FlipFlash. This was a unit with 8 (AG-1?) bulbs, 2-wide and 4-high. It had a
connector on each end that fit into the flipflash socket on the camera. The
top bulbs fired first, and as each bulb was used, the conductive path on the
internal circuit board was burned away so that the next bulb would fire.
After using the four top bulbs, you removed the unit, flipped it over, and
fired the other four bulbs. In a moment of rare engineering genius, the
designers set it up so that the bulbs fartherest away from the camera were
active, decreasing the red-eye effect. The FlipFlash was common on the later
Kodak Pocket Instamatics, also the Kodak Instant print cameras. Kodak also
came out with an electronic flash that would attach to these cameras and
sync through the flash socket.

"Bob Larter" <> wrote in message
news:49e0908a$...
> frank wrote:
>> On Apr 10, 5:19 am, Bob Larter <> wrote:
>>> frank wrote:
>>> [...]
>>>> fast. Anybody ever used flashbulbs? Thought not...
>>> Well, not since I was a kid. Remember the 4 shot bulbs that rotated
>>> after each shot?
>>
>> Yeah, Kodak Magic Cubes. One of the many camera types, mainly for
>> Instamatic, had the film that was in a cartridge.
>
> Yep, that's them.
>
>> Didn't know you could have them go off by dropping them.
>
> That's news to me too. I used to zap them with a 9V battery to set them
> off for fun.
>

Magicubes had no electical connection. If you were zapping cube flashes with
a battery, you were zapping flashcubes. Althougth you could zap Magicubes by
pushing a small screwdriver into the base and tripping the trigger wire.
If you really what to have fun with flashbulbs, get some of the big bulbs
with the standard Edison/household screw-in base (either #5 or #25, I can
never remember which), screw it into a ceiling lamp (make sure it's turned
off!), then wait for someone to turn on the light. Keep in mind that the
bulb could shatter, start a fire, cause a heart attack, break up a marriage,
or other fun stuff!

As for Kodak's film in cartridge, first there was the 126 "Instamatic" size.
Twelve exposures to a roll, the film about the width of 35mm. There was a
sprocket hole for each square frame that caught a pawl inside the camera for
double exposure prevention. Neg size was about 25mmX25mm. After 126 size,
there was 110 "Pocket Instamatic" size. The cartridge was similar in shape,
except much narrower as the film was about 16mm wide. Again there was a
sprocket hole for each rectangular frame. Finally in the Kodak cartridge
saga was the APS size, but the less said about that the better!

PDM wrote:
> "nospam" <> wrote in message
> news:110420090627593888%...
>> In article <49e0908a$>, Bob Larter
>> <> wrote:
>>
>>>> Yeah, Kodak Magic Cubes. One of the many camera types, mainly for
>>>> Instamatic, had the film that was in a cartridge.
>>> Yep, that's them.
>>>
>>>> Didn't know you could have them go off by dropping them.
>>> That's news to me too. I used to zap them with a 9V battery to set them
>>> off for fun.
>> if you used a battery to fire them, then they were regular flash cubes.
>>
>> magicubes were mechanically fired by a spring which when released, hit
>> a pin on the bulb which caused it to flash. you could flash one bulb
>> by poking a screwdriver into one of the holes, or if you threw a
>> magicube on the ground, all four springs would release and all four
>> bulbs would flash.
>>
> Guess there are a lot of old guys posting to this group (yeah! all right, I
> remember them too!).
> PDM

Ken Hart wrote:
> "Bob Larter" <> wrote in message
> news:49e0908a$...
>> frank wrote:
>>> On Apr 10, 5:19 am, Bob Larter <> wrote:
>>>> frank wrote:
>>>> [...]
>>>>> fast. Anybody ever used flashbulbs? Thought not...
>>>> Well, not since I was a kid. Remember the 4 shot bulbs that rotated
>>>> after each shot?
>>> Yeah, Kodak Magic Cubes. One of the many camera types, mainly for
>>> Instamatic, had the film that was in a cartridge.
>> Yep, that's them.
>>
>>> Didn't know you could have them go off by dropping them.
>> That's news to me too. I used to zap them with a 9V battery to set them
>> off for fun.
>>
>
> Magicubes had no electical connection. If you were zapping cube flashes with
> a battery, you were zapping flashcubes.

Probably so. It was long enough ago that I don't remember the details.

C J Campbell wrote:
> Bruce said:
>> C J Campbell wrote:
>>>
>>> Even Bresson did not just walk around pointing the camera
>>> aimlessly, squeezing the shutter with his shut. Bresson worked hard to
>>> capture his moments. He was not a chimpanzee randomly pecking keys on a
>>> typewriter to produce the works of Shakespeare. Bresson's work is a
>>> tribute to the documentary photographer's ability to anticipate,
>>> visualize and capture a moment all in a split second. But he did not
>>> skip any of those steps, whether he realized it or not.
>>
>> All true, but HCB was a prolific shooter and took a great many photos
>> while out shooting. Even though there are many volumes of his published
>> work, we have seen only very few of those shots.
>>
>> Perhaps there is a valid comparison to be made with National Geographic
>> shooters who typically produced over 10,000 shots on film in order to
>> illustrate an article with only a couple of dozen, if that.
>
> Gregg Gibson told me that he typically takes over 7,000 frames at a
> wedding. He winnows those down to about 130 that he shows the happy
> couple, and they make their selection from those.
>
> Gibson did not win two Pulitzer Prizes by taking 10,000 copies of the
> same image with only slight variation among them. I have seen him at
> work; he takes one shot -- then changes position, focal length, or
> something else. When he is done with a shoot he is literally dripping
> with sweat because he is moving around so actively. He may shoot 100
> frames or more in the space of a minute or two. Each frame will be
> radically different.
>
> How he keeps that energy level up at an entire wedding is beyond me.
>
> Nat Geo photographers do not always take 10,000 images and select only a
> dozen. Sometimes they have the opportunity to do that; sometimes not.
> Sometimes you get only a handful of images to choose from. That's the
> way the cookie crumbles.
>
> I do not know how many pictures Eddie Adams took on February 1, 1968. He
> got the Pulitzer for only one of them -- the execution of a Viet Cong
> officer by General Nguyen Ngoc Loan. This execution was also filmed by a
> TV crew. A documentary interviewing Adams, showing the picture, and also
> a film clip of the execution can be seen here:
>
> http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6459381285349469159

I like that idea of roaming around snapping as you explore. I usually do
about 200 photos for a few hours of visiting some place and winnow that
down to about 50 photos. That's hard work, culling.

> Obviously, Adams could not take 10,000 images of this execution. He had
> time for one. The entire execution, from the time that they start
> dragging the Viet Cong into the street to the time that he is lying in
> it, is less then 5 seconds. That was it. I do not know what else he shot
> that day, but for that day, and perhaps for the entire war, it was "the"
> picture.
>
>>
>> I am not suggesting (in either case) that the published shots happened
>> by chance. Far from it: I have no doubt that great care was taken with
>> the majority of shots taken, and that a very large percentage of them
>> would be considered suitable for publication.
>>
>> However, I also have no doubt that the taking of such large numbers of
>> images in both cases actively contributes to the extremely high standard
>> of published work - work to which we are privileged to have access at
>> the small cost of buying a book, or the magazine.
>
> Indeed. I don't think people fully appreciate this. We have come a long
> way from attempting to communicate with stained glass windows and
> illuminated manuscripts painstakingly constructed over a period of
> decades. I am not sure that it is always for the better, but on the
> whole I believe it is.
>

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